Transcript
Welcome to the Blaget Friends show
Hi, what's up you guys? Famous Ashley Grant here and I'm so excited to bring you Robin Rewine on the Blaget Friends show.
So Robin, before we get started, I have to ask you the most important question. Will you be my Blaget Friend?
Of course. Yes.
Ah, fantastic. Okay, so let's just dive right in. Let's tell everybody what it is that you do.
I started my blog, Masshole Mommy, back in 2009. And there was a story behind the Masshole thing. But I started the blog just for fun, for no reason other than to keep a diary of my life, which I did.
And then I, you know, joined social media as they came out, like I was on Instagram from day one. Now I'm on TikTok, you know, and it just spiraled out of control from there.
So you said you did it to have a diary. What exactly were you aiming for whenever you decided to launch the blog?
I would say mostly parenting advice. My first blog post was a complaint post about my neighbor.
And I, you know, I did some parenting things, but my kids were really little. You know, I started in 2009. My oldest son was, how old was he back then?
He would have been five, so there would have been two and five. So they were little and I just wanted to, you know, keep track of all the places we went, all the things we did.
And that was my main goal. And then it just kind of spiraled from there.
Now, whenever you first started, how active were you with it?
I'm super active back then. I was posting a blog post every day.
Holy cow. Yeah, but back then it was different because there was no sponsored stuff. It was, there were like link parties or, you know, some bloggers would post Q&As.
So I would fill those out with my answers and just go from there. I used to do a Man Crush Monday or Man Crush Wednesday too.
And I posted a lot of pictures of Sawyer from Lost without his shirt on. I stopped doing those after a while.
Once I found out you couldn't take images from Google, that's a whole other thing.
Yeah. But yeah, it was just, it was junk back then. It was junk.
I love that though. I mean, because, you know, whenever we, whenever I first started blogging, it was very raw as well.
It was like just, you know, stuff that was going on. At the time I was a freelance writer for different media outlets down in Tampa.
And so it was like the only place I could put what was going on that they wouldn't publish. So it's just like a way to keep track of, okay, I went here. I did this.
I, you know, and I tried all these things, but you're right. It has changed a lot over the years.
Yeah. And it's like these days you can't just throw any old posts up. You have to actually think like, okay, what's my head like going to be? What's my SEO going to look like? How many words?
So much work.
Yes. Yes.
It's almost not even worth it sometimes. You know what I mean?
Oh, I do.
It's hours and hours. And when you do a recipe post, like, my God, hundreds of pictures that I have to go through and edit. And it's so much work.
Yeah. And sometimes you have to like make the recipe like six or seven times just to get the right shot.
Yeah.
Oh, that's the worst. Cause like I did a sponsored post for an Apple company a while back and I love like doing different things with apples.
But by the end of it, I was like, I don't ever want to see another apple.
I'm like, I hate apples right now.
Oh my gosh. Yes. I completely understand that.
Okay. So you said something that I want to take you back to. You said there was a story behind the Masshole Mommy. What is the story of how you started the blog name?
Well, it's okay. So a mess hole is somebody from Massachusetts who I would say isn't a good driver and then just kind of spiraled into being like somebody who just doesn't care.
You know, we're just like, we know we're awesome. Screw you.
And it started out with, you know, bad driving and basically all the other New England states would call Massachusetts drivers, Massholes, New York included, which is not a New England state, but they border Massachusetts.
So all these states would refer to us as Massholes because of the way we drive, which actually isn't even that bad.
Rhode Island drivers are a hundred times worse, but I'm not going to get into that in case you have any Rhode Island listeners, but they are, they're the worst.
And, you know, I mean, it's a name that we take as a compliment at this point, like somebody calls us a Masshole. We're like, yeah, we are. Thank you.
So I knew immediately that it was going to be Masshole Mom or Mommy, and I went with Masshole Mommy because my kids were little at the time and it's just, I've been Masshole Mommy. My kids are going to be 15 and 18 this summer, but I'm still Mommy in my own head.
You will always be Mommy. That's the, that's the rule. Even whenever they're, you know, whenever you're 60 or 70 or if you're, if you're lucky enough to make it to 80 or 90, you're always going to be Mommy.
Yeah. Well, right now I'm a bruh or dude or bro, but I'm in my head, I'm a mommy.
I love it. I love it. So now with your, with your blog, do you make money from it?
I have. I have in the past, I've actually made some good money in the past and I've kind of gotten lazy with that. I haven't really, a lot of blog opportunities, opportunities that you have to apply for.
And I'm too lazy. I always think if they want me, they'll come to me.
Also, before I get into all that, I want to say that I feel like the title of my blog has held me back from a lot of opportunities, which is okay. And I understand not everybody understands what a Masshole is.
I know it looks a lot like an expletive word and I get that, but I do feel like a lot of PR reps and a lot of people don't understand that it's just a play on words and it's a joke. So I feel like it has helped me back a lot.
But back to your question, I have made some money. I've gone on some awesome press trips. I've, you know, done some really cool experiences over the years.
Johnny Wahlberg was my number one experience. That was one of the best days of my life, like right up there with having kids.
I've cut down on that because honestly I don't want to go on a trip and then have to work the whole time. So I don't do those as much anymore. And plus, you know, with COVID everything kind of slowed down.
But I have made some really good money, but not as much currently.
It's actually kind of refreshing though to kind of hear that because, you know, in today's hustle culture, people are so obsessed with, oh, I got to get every single penny I can out of every single opportunity.
And so to hear you say that that's not really as much of a focus. Like I said, this is very refreshing. Now, do you also have like a day job on the side or is this like your full time thing?
Not anymore. I got laid off in October. So I had had it. I don't even say, I don't even think it was full time. It was most, it was high level part time. But yeah, I got laid off. So now I'm just home. And honestly, I don't even blog that much anymore because I'm lazy.
I mostly focus on social media. I've actually been working on my TikTok. I've been trying to build that up lately. So I've been over here making silly little videos every day.
Now on the social side of things, would you say that you're getting sponsored opportunities for those?
Yes. Yes, I would say that, but not as many. It's Instagram. It's 100% Instagram. My Facebook, I've gotten so many bans over the past year or two that now it's restricted. So people don't see my Facebook.
I have a ton of Facebook followers, but now they get like 30 likes when they used to get 3000 likes. So I don't even really focus on Facebook anymore. So I would say Instagram is where I get most of my opportunities from.
Yeah, that's about it.
Okay.
I do get some, but not that many because I'm lazy. I'm just, I'm super lazy. I'm not going to say you're lazy. I'm not going to say you're lazy. I'm going to say you're efficient.
That's the new thing I've become obsessed with. I've been following a frugal fit mom on YouTube and she's like, no, it's not lazy. It's we're being efficient.
I like it. I would also say part of it's picky being picky. You know, there are just some things I don't want to put on my feet. Yeah. So I pick and choose and usually I choose not to do it. But I do have a cool thing coming up with a Girl Scout cookies.
Looking forward to eating some thin mints very soon. They should be coming soon.
Yeah, there's a there's all kinds of recipes that have been coming out of things to do with thin mints and of course you also have all the copycat recipes of how to get mints whenever you don't have them at home.
So those kind of crack me up. Now, we have mentioned Instagram a few times and that's where I love following you because you do something that I think is brilliant and I don't think you do it from a marketing standpoint.
I know, but every single day I look, I like look for your Instagram feed because you share the coolest stories. When did you start sharing memes as your stories?
Well, that came out of Facebook. I used to share probably 20 to 40 memes a day on Facebook on my Facebook page. And then the band started coming and I was like, oh my gosh, all these people are sending me messages looking for my posts, but I can't post because I'm in Facebook jail for 30 days.
So I started posting them to my Instagram stories because I could post them to my Facebook stories at the same time. And now it just, it's become a thing and people look for them and I get so many messages every day.
If I haven't posted, I usually post around seven, eight o'clock at night and if I had like nine o'clock and I haven't posted yet, I've got 30 messages in my inbox. Where are the memes? Oh my god, even on vacation, I got to provide the memes for my people.
It's just one of those things people just expect it now and I don't want to let anybody down. So there will always be memes on my Instagram stories every night around seven ish PM Eastern time.
I love the memes. I get a kick out of them. In fact, I may or may not have like 200 of the screenshots of some of the stuff you share.
You should save my phone. Oh my gosh, because I saved the good ones. Yeah. And there are so many good ones. Oh my gosh. Yeah.
Where do you find them?
Where do you find them all? Facebook. I find them all on Facebook, which is funny that I would get all these bands on Facebook considering a repost things I found on Facebook.
But have they ever told you why they're banning you on Facebook?
Yeah, they give me lay. It just goes against the community standards, which whatever I mean, I had gotten a ban for one. It was a complaint about a wife complaining about her husband not loading the dishwasher correctly.
And it got tagged for hate speech. I did appeal it. And that one, they gave me back access after like seven days instead of 30 days. But I'm like, come on. That's not hate speech. I mean, I guess it is, but it's not.
Yeah, I think guys don't know how to load a dishwasher. So I wasn't posting that at all.
Yeah, one of the ones that I got into Facebook jail for was so stupid. It was around Halloween. And it was a photo of a witch in a tree. And it said, don't drink and fly.
And yeah, and I was like, that's funny. And they said that it was promoting violence. Oh my God. And I'm like, are you kidding me right now? Like everyone knows it's a joke. Like if you don't know it's a joke, then get off my page, Karen.
For real though. Yeah. But I can post that kind of stuff on my Instagram stories. Knock on wood, I guess I should say. And it doesn't get flagged. Yeah. So some of this stuff is really raunchy. But it's stuff that I find funny.
Part of that comes back to me being a mass hole, because I feel like we're a whole different breed up here in Massachusetts, honestly. We have a whole different dark sense of humor that a lot of people don't get.
Because it's a lot colder up there. Oh my God. Oh my gosh. We had a blizzard two weeks ago. And where I am, we had like 30 inches of snow. It was obscene. That is obscene. I freak out when I get just six inches of snow.
Oh my gosh. It was bad. Wow. So now the sharing of the memes. Do you think that that's helped you grow your followers? Yes, I have. I do. Because a lot of people share them from me.
And when other people see the shares, they tend to follow. So yes, I do think it helps. But honestly, I don't do it for that. I just do it to entertain people 100% just to entertain people.
Because so many people send me messages and people love them. So like I said, I can't let people down. They are a hoot and a half. I mean, I absolutely love the stuff you share.
And I'm not kidding when I say like every single day when I have downtime, if I need a funny, I look for it. Because my husband and I, we have this silly little thing we do. We have a smile folder, a laugh folder.
And whenever we're in a bad mood, we open the folder and we just look through funny stuff until we can get a better mood. And so that's where all these screenshots go.
It's because it's like I got to share my funnies for my honey because he's got to, you know, we got to get in a good mood. And there's something so wonderful about just like just letting loose and laughing because there's so much seriousness.
Oh my god, there's so much seriousness in this world. And so just to just to let it go for a little while and just crack up for a little bit. I love it. I absolutely love it.
That's a great idea. I actually, I feel like I should start sharing them with my husband. I can't even get him to look at my Instagram stories. I got to work harder on that.
Yeah. So all you got to do is just take a screenshot and text it to him. That's what I do. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So but it's so funny because like we both work from home and he literally his desk is right next to mine.
And, and so I'll send him a text and he's like, seriously, he couldn't just show me the damn phone.
That takes effort. So I totally get it. So I'm curious though. You know, you said that you started the blog whenever you were sort of doing parenting stuff. Would you say that your niche is more lifestyle or family? What would you call your niche?
I would call it more lifestyle. It's hard to classify it because I do some recipes and then I do some local Massachusetts stuff and then I do some Disney stuff and I do a little bit of everything. So I would definitely classify it more as lifestyle.
Although for a while I was mostly focusing on Massachusetts and I live in the South shore area of Massachusetts. So I'm in southeastern Massachusetts and I feel like I was sharing a lot of stuff for a long time and I get a lot of messages from people asking, where should I go? What should I do? Is there a restaurant nearby?
You know, how's the parking, you know, from going to the Wayne center in Boston? Like I get a lot of those messages still. And it's nice to be able to help people. I love being able to help people and share my experiences. And someday I would love to rein it back to that.
Someday.
Now, so, okay, you do the lifestyle stuff and you do a lot of other stuff, it sounds like. It's not all just one niche. What do you say to the people who are like, oh, riches are in the niches and if you don't niche down, you're not going to ever make any money.
It's hard because I can see both sides of it.
And for me personally, I do what I want. And if you don't like it, go look at another blog. And that's kind of the attitude I've always had. Like if it's not for you, keep scrolling.
I love that. Good. Okay, cool. And see, to me, the thing is like I understand that yes, the riches are in the niches, but there's something to be said about having like multi passionate people.
And I think Marie Forleo calls it multi passionate entrepreneurs. She called them that and something about that like even though you know you want to hone in on one audience, being able to talk about whatever the hell you want is sometimes it's so.
Yeah, exactly. And I kind of feel like you know as long as you're using categories, and people will see what they came there for. What's wrong with just sharing whatever you want.
And that's always been my attitude. And I'm going to keep. I'd say it's a great attitude. In fact, I kind of got scared there for a little bit because you know that was being drilled into my head so much.
I you know because I'm a copywriter by day that's what I do during the day is I go straight for companies. And so, they're always drilling into your head you know you guys stick with the niche stick with the niche.
But like sometimes it's like, well, what if I want to just you know write about something that's completely off the rails today.
Exactly. Exactly. And plus it opens your socials or your blog to a whole different audience like you don't know who's going to share what you don't know if somebody's going to see you know that off the mark blog post or whatever like you just don't know.
Well, and the funny thing to me is like, you know, with, with all the hashtags we're using these days, and all the algorithm stuff, people are really only going to see the things that they're looking for anyway.
So, why not just share whatever you want to. And I mean, I'm sure any expert that ever hears this if they, for some reason were to find my show would be like, No, you're wrong.
But at the same time it's like you know, if you are doing something that's in a niche, more power to you, but I kind of feel like if you are focusing on lifestyle, have fun with it do whatever you want.
Exactly. Exactly. It's freeing. Yeah, you know, just post about whatever you want. Yes.
So, what would you do differently if you started today versus when you started back in 2009.
Honestly, I'd probably pick a different blog name. I love it. And it's me, and I embrace it. But like I said before, I really do think it helped me back some a lot, you know, like, I've seen a lot of the OG bloggers that I started with.
I go on to make hundreds of thousands of dollars and I just feel like they were offered things that I wasn't offered. And it was because of my blog name, because I'm a good writer.
You know, I take pictures, I do everything I need to do for SEO, I do everything right.
You know, and they're taking off and I'm still, you know, a little guy, which is fine. Like I honestly don't care but I feel like if I had wanted to become a serious blogger I probably would have picked a different name.
But the thing is, it's like, our brands really so prudish that they can't get that funny. Yes. Yes.
I've had specific emails sent to me that have said, we can't work with you because of your blog name. Yeah, because they don't understand it. And I get it. I get it. And I'm not knocking them for that.
They don't want to be associated with something that rhymes. Can I swear on the.
Okay, so I don't want to be, they don't want to be associated with something that rhymes with asshole, and I get it. I get it. I would never knock them for that.
Yeah, I don't think that I don't think the word asshole would get us the explicit strike I think it's just when you use the F word.
Okay. I wasn't planning on using that right now anyways I'll save that for the memes on.
I love it. I love it. Yeah, it's interesting though, that you say that you know brands are kind of picky about names because, you know, I'm a friend.
She has wine in her name. And so some people will not talk to her, simply because she's associated with alcohol. And she was honestly afraid that she was going to lose out on a brand deal that she had had when she when she had a previous name
with her brand, a brand update if you will a rebranding. And, you know, it was a it was a family friendly company and she was she was concerned that they were going to let her go but they didn't luckily, but, but it's just, it is interesting that certain
names do give you like that scarlet letter.
Yeah, absolutely 100% that's happened to me. And like I said it's fine. I do my own thing. And I'm happy you know I'm happy with my name, and I've been in the grocery store and people have come up to me and be like, Oh my gosh you're a master mommy.
And then I turn red and I have to go hide and, you know, get away from those people because it makes me feel uncomfortable. But, you know, like, it is what it is, you know, and I'm not changing it now.
Yeah. So you don't you don't think about rebranding at all and changing it to a different name. Well, yes I have actually because only because my husband and I are planning on moving to Florida.
After my youngest son graduates from high school in 2026 so four years from now. And I had said to him, his name is Christian I, and I had said you know Christian, how am I going to go to Florida and be Masshole mommy that's not going to work.
So we've been trying to think of names, Masshole goes out, yeah, like something like that. I might have to rebrand when I'm in Florida because the Masks are not going to like that I'm using that, and I'm not a master anymore.
That's funny. That's what maybe you just need a whole new blog.
Right, actually, my people keep them both.
Well, is there anything that I didn't ask you that you really want to say on here.
Um, I don't think so but to circle back, I do want to reiterate that meeting Donnie Wahlberg was one of the greatest days of my life.
You don't even know, like I have gone to this blog event in Boston, I don't even remember what the event was.
I can't I'm trying to think I can't remember what it was but he was there, and he did photos for probably about one minute, and I pushed, swear to God I pushed like 30 people out of my way to get to him, and I did get to him and I got my picture it's
my Facebook profile picture for life. Jenny McCarthy took the picture and it was literally right up there with having my children.
That is awesome.
And that was this recent.
Was this probably for maybe four years ago.
I lost track of time.
So should I gather that you watch Blue Bloods.
Oh yeah, I did. I don't have cable anymore and I don't know where to find it now but yeah, yeah we cut the cable cord like God five years ago and we haven't gone back.
Yeah, still worth it to get rid of it. Well before I let you go. What advice would you give a new blogger that wants to start today.
Oh, I would say to focus on the socials, I think social media is where it where it's at.
So get on TikTok. I've been working my butt off on TikTok. Get on Instagram, just share, share, share, share three four times a day. Get your face out there, interact with people you want to that you look up to.
Yeah, and just do it. Don't hesitate if you're thinking about it do it. You won't regret it and if you don't like it and it's not for you, then you can stop.
Yeah, and then save all the videos and repurpose them so you can use them on multiple channels.
Exactly. Exactly.
Well, excuse me I got all excited. Where can people find you online.
I'm Massful Mommy everywhere my blog is MassfulMommy.com and then on every social media you can think of, I'm at Massful Mommy.
You know what I just realized that we were talking about it before we actually began, and we didn't do it on the record. So, the way that you and I met was through a blogger roundup group.
Do you think that these days, it's worth it to try to look for those and connect with other bloggers?
No, don't waste your time. I've wasted hours of my life in those groups and I mean, they were fine back then but I feel like things have advanced past that now.
Yeah, stay on Facebook, Facebook is down. They don't care about us.
It's just a pay to play playground.
It is, honestly, it's not worth it. They're just going to give you a ban for a silly meme about a guy not loading the dishwasher correctly.
Yeah, and stay on Instagram, stay on TikTok, even go back to Twitter. I've been trying to update my Twitter. I'm not really great on Twitter because it's kind of lame but that's where I started.
I started on Twitter before I had a blog, you know, so I've had that for so many years, but yeah, stay on socials and just keep posting, keep posting good content, hashtag the crap out of it and interact with everybody, respond to every comment.
I love it. I love it. This is fantastic. Well, this was a lot of fun and I really appreciate your time today.
Yeah, thank you. This was super fun.
Thanks for being on the show.
Bye.